I am drinking gin & wrote about 18 long titles i randomly chose using wikipedia
If the New Sincerity is anything real or coherent (and I wrote that post last Monday because I, like others, am trying to figure out whether that’s so, or will be so), then we should be able to identify the devices or moves that define it—that arguably make a piece read as being “New Sincere.” The “New” implies they produce that sincere effect right now, in the current literary landscape; whether the techniques or devices are entirely new doesn’t matter (they could be older techniques, fallen out of prominence, now returned). Similarly, it’s irrelevant whether the author using them is “really” being sincere. What matters instead is that
- Those devices exist;
- People think they “feel sincere” (as opposed to other devices, which don’t);
- “Being sincere” has some value at the present moment.
Why sincerity? What is its present value? My broad and still developing belief is that “sincere” writing is one means of breaking with the aesthetics of postmodernism and self-referentiality: invocation of Continental Theory, metatextuality, excessive cleverness, hyper-allusion, &c. What makes writing “sincerely” even more delicious when perceived against postmodernism 1960–2000 is that it proposes to offer precisely what pomo said didn’t matter or couldn’t exist: direct communion with another coherent, expressive self, even truth by means of language. (Don’t tell Chris Higgs!)
One of my first impressions of the NS came when I started noticing artists and authors using longer titles—in particular, long rambly ones with strong emotional resonances. My thought then and I think now was that both the length and the ramble, as well as the emotive quality, signaled non-mediation: a desire to appear uncensored, unrevised. Those titles stood out (defamiliarized the title) because they failed to comply with what a “proper,” “edited,” “thoughtful” title should be.
Is this a sensible thing to argue? Have I had too many G&Ts? Let’s pursue …
Books Without Covers
“The Internet” by Eric Amling
Here are the names of some manuscripts I’m reading with observations about the content of each manuscript and sample poems (the picture above has nothing to do with this post, except that it’s a collage by Eric Amling that I like). It would be rad if other people blurbed about manuscripts they are reading (their own or their friends or whatever). Feel free to share poems from other unpublished manuscripts in the comments. Also, if any publishers would like to contact the poets mentioned in this post in order to read their manuscripts for possible publication, please let me know and I’ll forward your requests to them.
Colony Wife Box Fairy Boy
1. A second preview of the final issue of Lamination Colony has been posted in the form of Joyelle McSweeney’s “Welcome a Revolution”
2. @ Writing Prompts, Joe Hall is interviewed about his Pigafetta is My Wife, including writing advice:
Slaughter a pig, plank okra, join the commune, build a structure with indigenous materials, persecute your enemies, embrace your friends.
Most award winning poetry is just awful.
Buy my book.
For every procedure used to write a poem, develop and implement a counter procedure. You can sort it out at the end.
Pray to your god.
Stay in shape.
Don’t buy my book.
Write.
3. At Your Brain’s Black Box, Ben Spivey interviews Sasha Fletcher
4. Red Issue of the Fairy Tale Review has been released.
5. @ Largehearted Boy, Andrew Ervin’s Book Notes for his newly released and beautiful Extraordinary Renditions.
I Like What The Hell Is Going On Over Here
Sasha Fletcher reads it up on Apostrophe Cast.
Science Is Fiction was a big wow for me, I recommend finding yourself a copy, if only to see this in all its glory. I saw it on a projector and very loud, which was a good thing to do. The DVD had been skipping the whole time but for some reason on this one not at all, it reminds me of J.G. Ballard’s The Crystal World.
These Days I Just Want To Do Something That Makes Me Feel Something: An Interview with Sasha Fletcher
To celebrate the official release of Sasha’s exciting new book, WHEN ALL OUR DAYS ARE NUMBERED MARCHING BANDS WILL FILL THE STREETS & WE WILL NOT HEAR THEM BECAUSE WE WILL BE UPSTAIRS IN THE CLOUDS (Mud Luscious Press), he and I chewed the old question/answer…but first: publisher J.A. Tyler has graciously offered to give away a free copy of the book to whomever leaves the most interesting comment in the comment box below…
HIGGS: I wonder if you’d begin by describing your process. To me, this book seems meticulously constructed: the way certain images and themes repeat and resonate, build upon each other and then collapse or disappear or mutate, the way the final passage almost seems to encapsulate all of those images and themes. Did this book come to you as an idea first or were you just thinking on paper as you went along? Did it take years or days? Did you compose it from opening to closing or did you compose it in sections and then arrange them?
FLETCHER: The book came out of several things.
Do You Want To Help An Independent Author Get Fancy Drunk?
Sasha Fletcher reports via GMail chat on how we can turn indie lit commerce into alcoholic camaraderie:
so there’s like 20 copies left
and if we sell out today, ja will paypal me money to get drunk on fancy beers
What’s he talking about? He’s talking about his novella When All Our Days Are Numbered Marching Bands Will Fill the Streets & We Will Not Hear Them Because We Will Be Upstairs in the Clouds, which you can pre-order from MLP. It’s a fine adventure, strange and hellbent on sweetness. Not only will Fletcher get drunk if you pre-order fast enough, but you will get some swag, including an exclusive PDF chapbook with bonus chapters and art from Zach Dodson, who is responsible for the fine picture to the left. If your sky has ever looked like the sky in that picture, maybe now’s the time to act.
Back to Grad School
I used to blog here about getting an mfa in creative nonfiction, but since I finished classes there’s nothing much to report other than I am working on my thesis. Sasha Fletcher, however, just began his mfa in poetry and he’s writing about it over at his blog. He’s got the talented and lovely Sarah Manguso for workshop, Timothy Donnelly for a poetry craft seminar, Marjorie Welish for 20th century experimental poetry, and a lecture from the adorable Richard Howard titled “The Beginning of the End.”
Expect me to crash the guest lectures while I’m still in the city. Hopefully they’ll be as memorable as the Joyce Carol Oates one last semester.
Influences 5: Sasha Fletcher
Here is the fifth response to my influences post. The respondent is Sasha Fletcher.
Prompts:
1) Pick one of the pieces you chose and describe the thing about it that seems particularly innovative about it.
2) Tell me what changed about your writing because of that innovation.
Answers after the jump: READ MORE >